Bible studies

Those bewildered people who maintain as an article of faith the literal
truth of the Bible are, in fact, the book's worst enemies. The immense
strength of the Bible lies in its uncertainties, particularly its scope
for interpretation and commentary. We would expect nothing else from a
Jewish book.

Atheists such as we can dismiss the book
–
leaving aside its historical record of the tribe
–
as a collection of fairy stories, but we cannot
dispute its power to provoke thought. Encountering the Bible in school
without forced learning by rote
–
such as that required by another religious book we might mention
–
is an educational act. It does not supply answers, it supplies questions.

The fact that the Bible is a collection of very different texts from
very different authors adds to its value: it is not a religious
monologue or rant – unlike another religious book we might mention – it is a library of different books. Can we use the now worn-out word
'diversity'?

On many occasions the biblical texts are profoundly allegorical, their
language, too, deeply metaphorical. There is no definitive meaning to be
had: what meaning we readers extract says more about us than the text we
are reading. The process of extracting meaning is in itself a
fundamentally religious process, full of reflection and self-analysis.
In this the literalists completely miss the point.

Those desiccated people who want to suppress all pictorial or literary
commentary on religious texts –
such as the readers of another religious book we might mention
– miss the leverage that is derived from artistic intepretation,
which is ultimately a metaphoric act upon these extremely metaphoric
texts. Such works have all the validity of scriptural commentary. More
than that, they 'bring the soul of man to God' as Yeats put it.

We looked critically at the accepted interpretations of two biblical stories
nearly a year ago: Abraham's (near) sacrifice of Isaac [Genesis 22:1-18] and the
story of Doubting Thomas [John 20:24-29].

William Blake (1757–1827), Book of Job, no. 14, 'When the Morning Stars Sang Together', c. 1805, The Morgan Library, New York.
When the stars threw down their spears / And water'd heaven with their tears: / Did he smile his work to see? / Did he who made the Lamb make thee?
William Blake, Songs of Experience, 'The Tyger', 1794.

That book alone
is a mighty sword of burning gold against the trite, the glib, the
bigoted and the over-confident who infest public life these days, one
which we atheists are happy to wield, even if Christians won't
– and while the other lot are learning their pre- and pro-scriptive lines, hoping their powers of memorisation will get them to heaven.

7–
So went Satan forth from the presence of the Lord, and smote Job with sore boils from the sole of his foot unto his crown.

8–
And he took him a potsherd to scrape himself withal; and he sat down among the ashes.

10–
But he said unto her, Thou speakest as one of the foolish women speaketh.
What? shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?
In all this did not Job sin with his lips.

The Bible, Book of Job, chapter 2, King James' Version.

Or, as Georges de La Tour put it:

Georges de La Tour, Job raillé par sa femme 'Job Mocked by his Wife', 1630s. Image: Musée Départemental des Vosges, Épinal. We apologise for
the poor resolution of our image of this wonderful painting,
but the museum – kept afloat on public money – would prefer that you travel to Épinal and pay them €10 for a fleeting glimpse. Where are the painful boils when they are needed?

Update 25.10.2016

Looking once more at Georges de La Tour's magnificent painting, Joseph Roth's equally magnificent novel Job, the story of a simple man came to mind. Both are metaphors of the one biblical metaphor and should be considered side-by-side.

The story so far: Mendel Singer – the 'Job' of the book –
teaches the young children of a small Ukrainian village Hebrew and the Torah. The story begins around 1900.
Mendel Singer's work (he is a
melamed) is low-status and his income
meagre. He is a representative of the numberless poor who have no power over their destiny.
Nevertheless, he has a good marriage, he loves his wife
Deborah and they have a daughter and two sons. When Menuchim, the fourth
child, is born he appears to be severely mentally handicapped, almost sub-human. Deborah
is saving money as best she can so that she can take him to a 'miracle-worker' Rabbi.

'What are you trying to do, Deborah?', said Mendel Singer, 'the poor are
powerless, God does not throw stones of gold down from Heaven, they do
not win the lottery and they must bear their lot with humility. To the
one is given and from the other is taken away. I don't know why he is
punishing us, first with the sickly Menuchim and now with the healthy
children. Ah, when the poor man has sinned he suffers and when he is ill
he suffers. One has to bear one's fate! Let the sons join the army, they
will not come to harm! Against the will of Heaven we are powerless. "He
is the source of the thunder and lightning, he arches himself across all
the Earth, one cannot flee him" - so it is written.'

But Deborah, her hand on her hip above the bunch of rusty keys, answered
him: 'God helps those who help themselves', so it is written, Mendel!
You always know the wrong verses by heart. Thousands of verses have been
written and you memorise the most pointless ones! You have become so
stupid because you teach children! You give them a little bit of
understanding and they leave behind all their stupidity with you. A
teacher, Mendel! That's what you are, a teacher!